The Silence of 221B
by EstellaJean
Summary: Post Reichenbach John struggles to deal with the death of Sherlock. When he visits the flat for the last time he reflects on the secret feelings he has always harbored for the man but never got the chance to say. Sherlock painfully keeps his distance from the hurting doctor. A bittersweet little Johnlock oneshot


Just after Reichenbach Falls. John mourns Sherlock's death and Sherlock painfully keeps his distance.

Please read and review on my other story as well!

The Silence of 221B

There in the silence of 221B was an old burgundy arm chair. There was the distinctive smell of tea and tobacco and a staleness which was undefinable. There was the dust that lingered on the bookshelves and coffee tables despite the secret efforts of Mrs. Hudson that she thought would go undetected. There was the smooth wooden surface of the violin as it shined in the light of the window. Everything was frozen in golden crystallized light. The man's breath slowly claimed it, filling the cavity of his lungs with gold and dust and the memory of a man he tried not to let slip away. But it would not fill the hollow in his chest.

A breeze drifted from the open window, and down below the puzzling webs of human life continued on as people wandered the bustling streets of London in slow motion. John knew the tall man in the wool coat will never again be among them. His eyes would never again search for his dark curls and tall figure in a crowd and chase to catch up with him, leaving behind fear and self-doubt and that staggering loneliness like he did on the first night they met.

The man had run somewhere too far away, too unknown, for him to find him. He was left behind.

He was left behind like the violin which rested where its owner left it. It is where it would remain untouched by those long steady, calculated hands.

One of which John clung to a few days before. Lifeless.

Now the doctor stood in the doorway for what he imagined would be the last time. It was such an empty space without someone to claim its clutter. With no one to fill it with secrets and noise and laughter and yelling and music. Without Sherlock Holmes.

 _Sherlock Holmes_

Watson felt his insides collapse as he breathed in the name. He was wrung out, squeezed in and twisted until he dripped all the things he had been holding in since that first moment he met the detective. As the tears rushed to his eyes Watson doubled over, grabbing his stomach to try to stop the gushing of emotions, the fear of what life would be like now that he was buried with a black granite headstone above him. His best friend. The doctor gulped in air like he was drowning.

He closed his eyes _._ He stood straighter. With a shaky conviction he went over to the red armchair and sat down, letting all the weight that bore on him from the inside sink down with him into the cushion. He slowed his thoughts. He felt his heart beat returning to a normal pace. He memorized the feel of the chair against his back, and the placement of every item in the room. Then opened his eyes.

"It's so silent" he whispered to the vacant room. He looked around at the table with his laptop's screen darkened from disuse, and a million strewn papers, at the couch with Sherlock's blue robe flung over it in his half hazard way, at the cups of cold tea in the kitchen that were never drunk. His fingers drummed on the arm of the stiff red fabric.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump. He paused.

 _Sherlock used to do that._

 _An impatient tick. An expression of frustration and anxiety. Awaiting a new case._

His voice cracked slightly "I..." he cleared his throat. "I miss that about you... I miss..." He looked at the empty chair across from him and imagined a tall curly headed figure with striking blue eyes and sharp cheek bones. He leaned forward on his knees and wrung his hands together. His voice was calm, but his knuckles whitened. _Sherlock would have noticed that. He would have known I'm not ok._

He tried to talk with more strength in his words, tried to hide the things that wouldn't be seen even if they were shown.

"Your eagerness. Your excitement...A fervent passion for challenge. I thought you were bloody crazy sometimes" he chuckled slightly to himself but it only brought him a choked throat, and a sharp pain deep inside. The figure he imagined in front of him got fuzzier. His hair became a dark blob, the color of his eyes unidentifiable, his fine posture simply an unfocused shape. _Don't. Don't do this Sherlock...Just stop. When I open my eyes you're going to be sitting right there...You're going to be sitting there like you always are._ Watson closed his eyes.

Silence.

So silent that he could hear a constant tic in the corner of the room. He never even knew they had had a clock in the flat. His rested his head in his hands and felt the pads of his fingers and his sweaty palms holding himself together. Trying to clench in the tears with his teeth.

"You're going to be there Sherlock. You're going to be there. Like always."

"I know it goddamn it!" he growled in a half sob.

He felt the tears burning his eyelids and his jaw felt slack "You'll be there".

The presence he ached for became a desperate need for the man. The man who saved him from himself, from his self-made cage, his crutch. The man who saved him from his fear of the world by throwing him into the most dangerous parts of it, the most exhilarating parts. He saved him from loneliness. He gave him purpose. The man who was so bloody annoying and yet someone who he could be himself with. The man who he felt more for than he thought was possible to feel. But Sherlock would never know that. He would never know that in those moments when they catch each other's eyes he feels more safe than he's ever been. He's felt more warm, more alive, than he's ever been. He would never know that when they stood by that pool, so near to death, all he wanted to do was hold him. He would never know.

"I never told you" he whispered the words barely above a wisp of a breath.

The thought tipped his composure over the edge, his body slumped. He felt the heartbreak full on like being hit by a racing locomotive. A quiet sob broke the peace in the room, followed by trails of hot acid down his cheeks. His sobs were painfully dry, his throat raw and hoarse. Shudders shattered his body. The shocks kept coming and left him breathless as if someone was repeatedly knocking the air out of him. He crumpled into the arm of the chair and surrender to the incessant waves until he couldn't feel them anymore.

"I need you" His heart said, with its heavy, broken beats.

 **. . .**

A warm breeze drifted in again from the open window, fluttering papers on the desk, threatening to lift them up and send them around the room. And from the edge of the window, behind the bricks of the balcony, observant blue eyes watched quietly as the man on the chair slept uncomfortably. He slipped through the window with fluid grace from years of experience. For a while he just stood in front of the sleeping man, he noted the shudders in his breath, that his hair hadn't been combed in three days, that his socks didn't match. And John _always_ matched his socks. There was a stain on his sleeve of brandy and his knuckles on his right hand were slightly bruised. They were too recent to be from punching the Chief Superintendent five days ago. Perhaps he had punched a wall? Yes there was plaster dust on his shoe. It must have been earlier today. He started to lose it and then came here hoping to find some kind of normalcy and stability. Obviously from the appearance of John's puffed eyes and the scene Sherlock had just witnessed, that's not what he found.

He was broken alright. But he was alive. Sherlock would take a broken Watson over a dead one every time. But that didn't make it easier to watch. He clenched his jaw as an unfamiliar feeling seemed to threaten him. His pupils dilated in fear of the emotion. He breathed in, and then crouched down to John's face. He saw creases and wrinkles in his face which he had never detected. Frown lines he knew were there but that never seemed so apparent before. Sherlock knew what he was about to do would be risky and could ruin his elaborate plan, but an uncharacteristic and automatic urge directed him to grab the blue robe from the couch and draped it over his best friend's uncomfortable form, pulling it up under his chin. Watson's muscles relaxed somewhat in response to the gesture. Sherlock felt a sense of relief from it.

"I never left you John" he whispered "and I never will. You're not the only one who left words unsaid"

The tall man stood up and went to leave back through the window but before he left he turned around one more time, knowing it would be a very long time before he would see the blonde man again. He archived every detail about the moment. Then he slipped away.


End file.
